Mediating Identity: A Study of Media Influence on Organizational Identity Construction in a Celebrity Firm

This paper reports a longitudinal field study on the effects of positive media coverage on the reconstruction of organizational identity. The study highlights how intense positive coverage – to the point of turning an organization into a ‘celebrity’– influences both the way members understand their organization (sensemaking effect) and the gratification they derive from its positive representation (self‐enhancement effect). Our findings suggest that positive media representations foster members' alignment around an emergent new understanding of what their organization is. Over time, however, celebrity may ‘captivate’ members' organizational identity beliefs and understandings, and impede further identity work as media persist in the replication of representations that differ from members' experienced reality, but are too appealing to them to be publicly contradicted.     

Organizational Identity and Place: A Discursive Exploration of Hegemony and Resistance

abstract    This paper analyses how three distinct cohorts of workers in a recently merged UK-based College of Further Education understood their group and their organization's identities. We focus in particular, but not exclusively on how the groups' shared understandings of 'place' informed their identity accounts. Identities are theorized as being constituted within discursive regimes, and place treated as a discursive resource on which individuals and groups may draw in their attempts to author versions of their selves. In our case, understandings of place were also a resource on which some people drew in nostalgic reminiscence, and others used to fantasize about their preferred futures for the college. Framed by our intention to identify plurivocal native interpretations of place and identity in ways that promote the reading of polysemy back into case research, the contribution this paper makes is threefold. First, it adds to efforts to theorize organizations and identities as unstable social constructions constituted through acts of languaging. Second, it illustrates how different groups of local actors with distinct histories and value preferences may draw on their place of work in order to author contrasting versions of their organization's identity. Finally, our paper analyses the attempts made by senior managers and groups of other staff to define their organization in particular ways, as hegemonic 'moves' in an ongoing struggle for control over the organization as a discursive space.     

浅谈企业管理战略之组织文化建设——组织形象可识别系统(CIS)

本文概述了现代企业管理战略的前沿课题——组织形象可识别系统的内涵、发展、地位及若干功能,特别分析了业界近年来高度关注的组织形象可识别系统(企业CIS)的构成要素,结合了当今著名企业的相关案例,得出了以下结论:企业的CIS建设是企业管理中文化建设的不可分割的部分,企业的CIS建设有利于树立企业的特色,有利于增强企业的国际竞争力,有利于获得消费者的认同。综上所述,现代化的企业应努力学习世界500强的优秀企业,努力进行企业文化的建设,这样才有利于我国的本土企业赶超世界著名企业。     

Strategists and Strategy-making: Strategic Exchange and the Shaping of Individual Lives and Organizational Futures

ABSTRACT A strategic exchange framework for the analysis of the relationship between the personal strategies of strategists and the strategic direction followed by organizations is presented. The exchange relationship that strategists have with their organization and the exchange relationship between the organization and the constituencies upon which it is resource dependent is examined and some of the processes and practices that this can entail are illustrated with the case of Strath Guitars. The case study also illustrates the value of ethnographic fiction science as an innovative type of research account which is especially appropriate for the reporting of studies of the detailed interpersonal and social processes associated with organizational strategy-making.     

The Dual Meaning of Managerial Careers: Organizational and Individual Levels of Analysis

A theoretical framework is proposed which brings out the duality of managerial careers by distinguishing between organizational and individual levels of analysis. At the organizational level, careers can be seen as part of a process of social reproduction, which points the way to linking organizational form and behaviour with comparatively stable career patterns characteristic of particular firms or kinds of firm. At the individual level careers are expressed as a sequence of work role transitions, representing choices between opportunities presented to managers by organizations. Each level of analysis illuminates a different aspect of managerial careers, but it is equally important that each should be seen in the light of the other.     

建筑企业组织管控体系优化设计——以ST公司为例

本文针对建筑企业面临的市场环境和行业现状,以ST公司为例,基于精干高效、权责清晰、合理跨度、平稳过渡原则,从企业组织结构、权责体系、岗位体系、流程体系四个方面对组织管控体系进行优化设计,旨在将企业资源与组织管控能力相匹配,充分挖掘企业内外部各种优势资源,最大程度发挥企业集聚效应,形成企业在组织架构、管理模式、资源人才、管理效率等方面的整体竞争优势,支撑企业战略目标和愿景的实现。     

Organizational sustainability identity: Constructing oneself as sustainable

In the literature, organizational sustainability identity tends to be treated as something that is ‘engineered’ within business organizations through control, reporting, target setting, strategic communication, and other instruments. Through a case study of a company mainly active within the recycling industry, an alternative understanding is given. A distinct organizational sustainability identity is, rather, a social construct based on perceptions of the core operations as “sustainable in themselves” and collaborative work with customers that is perceived as entailing sustainable solutions. Understood in this way, organizational sustainability identity has relatively little to do with formal controls such as codes, policies, reports used by management to position the company as sustainable. Rather, for organizational members, the process of constructing oneself as sustainable builds on convictions about the core operations and the possession of specific capabilities manifested in customer relations. The article adds to current literature through its constructivistic approach and through identifying underlying beliefs that condition the process of forming an organizational sustainability identity.     

Individual Performance in Turbulent Environments: The Role of Organizational Learning Capability and Employee Flexibility

Organizational learning capability (OLC) and employee flexibility help firms navigate the challenges faced by organizations operating in turbulent environments. OLC includes dimensions such as experimentation, risk taking, openness, dialogue, and participative decision making. Employee flexibility is considered a crucial tool for strategic human resource management in tackling environmental turbulence. Accordingly, we pose the following research question: how, and to what extent, is individual performance enhanced by OLC and employee flexibility in turbulent environments? The major impact that environmental turbulence has on change and flexibility requirements suggests that employee flexibility plays an important role in the impact OLC has on individual performance. However, we found no prior studies that explicitly analyzed this mediating function of employee flexibility. In this study, we tested three hypotheses that link OLC and individual performance, OLC and employee flexibility, and employee flexibility and individual performance. We applied a structural equation methodology, using partial least squares path modeling, to a sample of 174 academics at a Latin American university (a highly turbulent context). Our results show employee flexibility fully mediates the relation between OLC and individual performance given the presence of environmental turbulence. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Metaphor and the Dynamics of Knowledge in Organization Theory: A Case Study of the Organizational Identity Metaphor*

abstract Despite the increased salience of metaphor in organization theory, there is still very little conceptual machinery for capturing and explaining how metaphor creates and/or reorders knowledge within organization theory. Moreover, prior work on metaphor has insufficiently accounted for the context of interpreting a metaphor. Many metaphors in organization theory, including the ‘organizational identity’ metaphor, have often been treated in singular and monolithic terms; seen to offer a similar or largely synonymous interpretation to theorists and researchers working along the entire spectrum of disciplines (e.g. organizational behaviour, organizational psychology) in organization theory. We argue in this paper that contextual variation however exists in the interpretation of metaphors in organization theory. This argument is developed by proposing and elaborating on a so‐called image‐schematic model of metaphor, which suggests that the image‐schemata (abstract imaginative structures) that are triggered by the metaphorical comparison of concepts may vary among individuals. Accordingly, once different schemata are triggered the completion and interpretation of a metaphor may equally vary among different individuals or, indeed, research communities. These points associated with the image‐schematic model of metaphor are illustrated with a case study of the ‘organizational identity’ metaphor. The case study shows that this particular metaphor has spiralled out into different research communities and has been comprehended in very different ways as different communities work from very different conceptions, or image‐schemata, of ‘organization’ and ‘identity’, and use different theoretical frameworks and constructs as a result. The implications of the image‐schematic view of metaphor for knowledge development and theoretical progress in organization theory are discussed.     

个人组织价值观匹配对新生代工作积极性的影响

论文基于社会认定理论、匹配理论以及计划理论分析了个人组织价值观匹配如何影响新生代员工工作积极性,并探索组织承诺在两者之间所发挥的作用。研究结果表明,当个人组织价值观匹配程度越高时,新生代员工工作积极性越高,且组织承诺在两者之间存在着中介的作用。此结论丰富了论文的相关理论,同时对企业提高新生代员工积极性有一定的参考价值。     

Discourse and Audience: Organizational Change as Multi-Story Process

abstract    This article is critical of monological research accounts that fail to accommodate polyvocal narratives of organizational change, calling for more fully informed case studies that combine elements of a narrative approach with processual/contextual analysis. We illustrate how contrasting versions of the same change event by different stakeholders and by the same stakeholder for different audiences, raise theoretical and methodological issues in the analysis and presentation of data on organizational change. Our argument is that research narratives (that seek to develop understanding of change processes) are necessarily selective and sieved through particular discourses that represent different ways of engaging in research. They are authored in a particular genre and written to influence target audiences who become active co-creators of meaning. Organizational change viewed from this perspective is a multi-story process, in which theoretical accounts and guides to practice are authored consistent with pre-selected narrative styles. These, in turn, are purposefully chosen to influence target audiences, but this subjective crafting is often hidden behind a cloak of putative objectivity in the written and oral presentations of academic research findings.     

Bullying as Unacknowledged Organizational Evil: A Researcher's Story

The role of the sociopathic bully is considered in terms of his/her responsibility for acts of evil in organizations. First, the literature on bullying is considered with the suggestion made that the term bully may be something of a euphemism, contributing to the problem of bullying not being taken sufficiently seriously. Bullying is then considered as a means of torture in organizations. The case study is introduced, where the author—an academic—is daring to share her story. Several of Biderman's constructs of coercion (Amnesty International, 1975. Report on Torture. London: Gerald Duckworth.) are used to showcase the case material shared which, when taken together, depict the relentless and deliberate nature of the bullying that took place. The paper concludes with an evil outcome of the bullying but, also, the success of the target in surviving. Some practical considerations as to what to do if bullying takes place are considered.     

Exploring the Conceptual Expansion within the Field of Organizational Behaviour: Organizational Climate and Organizational Culture

Developments within social and exact sciences take place because scientists engage in scientific practices that allow them to further expand and refine the scientific concepts within their scientific disciplines. There is disagreement among scientists as to what the essential practices are that allow scientific concepts within a scientific discipline to expand and evolve. One group looks at conceptual expansion as something that is being constrained by rational practices. Another group, however, suggests that conceptual expansion proceeds along the lines of ‘everything goes’. The goal of this paper is to test whether scientific concepts expand in a rational way within the field of organizational behaviour. We will use organizational climate and culture as examples. The essence of this study consists of two core concepts: one within organizational climate and one within organizational culture. It appears that several conceptual variations are added around these core concepts. The variations are constrained by rational scientific practices. In other terms, there is evidence that the field of organizational behaviour develops rationally     

Organizational downsizing as convergence or reorientation: Implications for human resource management

This article proposes that there are two basic approaches to organizational downsizing. Downsizing as reorientation is the proper approach when organizations undertake major downsizing programs. In this approach, many elements of the organization are questioned and changed simultaneously. The goal is a fundamentally different, not just smaller, organization. Downsizing as convergence is part of continuous improvement, and its goal is to refine and streamline all ongoing organizational processes. Each of these approaches to downsizing involves a particular pattern of downsizing tactics, implementation processes, and organizational changes. Thus, each approach to downsizing generates different implications for human resource management.     

组织文化:会计师事务所质量控制的新视角

会计师事务所文化是联结会计师事务所人力资本和各项质量控制制度的一种机制,该机制的有效发挥将最终体现为会计师事务所整体执业质量的提高。基于新审计准则关于“会计师事务所应当建立以质量为导向的内部文化“的规定,本文探讨了会计师事务所组织文化对会计师事务所质量控制制度的建立、实施的影响及相互作用机理,并提出了培育质量导向的会计师事务所文化的若干建议。     

组织结构变革的实施策略分析 ——以Y公司为例

快速变化的竞争环境要求企业相应的做出战略调整,并对组织结构进行变革,以确保战略落地,组织结构变革的成功与否很大程度上决定了企业的发展能力.本文以Y公司为例,深入分析了Y公司组织结构的现状与问题、战略调整及业务发展要求,明确了变革的方式与步骤;同时,对Y公司组织结构变革的方案设计和实施策略进行了深入研究;最后,对变革效果进行了评估,总结了组织结构变革成功的方法与关键因素.本文对于要实施组织结构变革的企业而言,具有重要的实践意义.     

组织结构变革的实施策略分析 ——以Y公司为例

快速变化的竞争环境要求企业相应的做出战略调整,并对组织结构进行变革,以确保战略落地,组织结构变革的成功与否很大程度上决定了企业的发展能力.本文以Y公司为例,深入分析了Y公司组织结构的现状与问题、战略调整及业务发展要求,明确了变革的方式与步骤;同时,对Y公司组织结构变革的方案设计和实施策略进行了深入研究;最后,对变革效果进行了评估,总结了组织结构变革成功的方法与关键因素.本文对于要实施组织结构变革的企业而言,具有重要的实践意义.     

Leader Emergence in Nascent Venture Teams: The Critical Roles of Individual Emotion Regulation and Team Emotions

This study advances a theory of how different aspects of emotion regulation influence individual leader emergence in the intensely emotional context of nascent venture teams. Despite the growing amount of research on the role of leadership in the entrepreneurial process, the emergence of leaders in nascent venture teams has rarely been explored. Drawing on theories and research on leadership emergence and emotion regulation, we argue that the two aspects of emotion regulation (i.e., reappraisal and suppression) exert opposite effects on the degree to which nascent venture team members come to perceive an individual as a leader. We also theorize that team emotions arising from affective events moderate the relationship between reappraisal and leader emergence in such teams. Data from 103 nascent venture teams without prior leaders show a negative relationship between individuals’ trait disposition to suppress emotions and their emergence as leaders, and a positive relationship between their trait disposition to reappraise emotions and their emergence as leaders. Moreover, we find that negative team emotions magnify the positive association between reappraisal and leader emergence, while positive team emotions mitigate it. We discuss the implications of our findings for the literature on entrepreneurial leadership, entrepreneurial emotions, and leadership in general.     

Conferences as Venues for the Configuration of Emerging Organizational Fields: The Case of Cochlear Implants

abstract    I examine how conferences can be occasions for the configuration of emerging organizational fields by describing three that I attended during the development and commercialization of cochlear implants. These conferences served as venues for a variety of activities to unfold, ranging from the exchange of information to the enactment of technological possibilities. A full appreciation of conferences as holistic events, I argue, offers us a particularly valuable entry point into gaining a deeper understanding of how new fields are assembled in real time.